Updating psd file

FinalBuilder Discussion
1

Is there a way in FB6 to update the text in a layer in a PSD file? I don't need to change the formatting or anything like that - just the text.

Any ideas?

2

Hi Charles,

Photoshop has a scripting architecture, so you should be able to create a script which updates the layer, save the script to a Photoshop .jsx file (or similar) and then use FinalBuilder's "Shell Execute" action to open the .JSX and run it in Photshop.

See here for some guidelines:
http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/photoshop/sdk/index_scripting.html
http://www.adobeforums.com/webx/.ef7f2cb.59b55b6d

If you use the "Shell Execute" action with the setting"open", this basically does the exact same operation as you would get by double-clicking the file in Windows Explorer - ie for a JSX file, it will run it in Photoshop.

The catch is if you want to parameterize the script, ie by choosing a different PSD file each time. I think you will then need to load the data from a text file, or use the Text Find/Replace action (or similar) to update the .jsx script file with each new filename, before running.

Good luck.

Regards,

Angus

3

Thanks for the suggestion Angus, but (you knew that was coming) it's not going to solve my problem:

  1. I only have access to PS7, not the CS series. The cost of upgrading just so I can script a text change is insane.
  2. Once I get around to setting up a dedicated build server I'd have to install PS on that too. That's an even more insane cost.

I've looked at using GIMP instead, but that doesn't have the basic features I need, and while I could export the PSD and script GIMP to add the text I won't be able to branch the PSD with the rest of the source.

Can I trust Text Find/Replace to handle a PSD? It's a bit of a hack, but in this case it'd do the trick....

4

Hi Charles,

Sorry to hear that. If the text actually is visible in plaintext in the PSD file, you might be able to make that work, although it’s definitely an unsupported configuration. I don’t think that Photoshop would handle some things, like (For example) changing the length of the text in the file. Good luck.

Maybe someone else knows of a command line tool which is capable of editing properties like this in the PSD?

Regards,

Angus

5

Just a random thought which probably isn’t going to be useful to you… but… you can add text to a PDF file using the PDF Insert Text action. We’ve used this action ourselves to send out vouchers (in PDF format) with unique codes.